Covid means Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade will look a little different from usual this year. Instead of heading down Oxford Street, the action will take place in front of a ticketed crowd at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Those of us who can’t make it to the stadium on 5 March can watch the parade live on the ABC, where festivities will be hosted by a lineup that includes national drag treasure Courtney Act.
Courtney Act – AKA Shane Jenek – is no stranger to Mardi Gras. This is her fourth time hosting the parade and, after two years of the pandemic, she’s ready to make it a great one. “This year feels like we’re shaking off the cobwebs and remembering how to do it all again,” she tells Guardian Australia.
One object that will be indispensable to Act’s Mardi Gras look is a nameless device for sticking crystals on your face – a makeup choice that, “really adds a big bang for its buck,” she says. Here, she tells us about the oomph-adding properties of a little sparkle, as well as the story of some other important personal belongings.
What I’d save from my house in a fire
A pair of Oprah Winfrey’s shoes. They’re purple and gold Louboutin sandals that I bought from the Oprah gift store in Chicago in 2010. She had a section called “Oprah’s Closet” where she sold her pre-loved clothing, and then all the money went to her school for girls in South Africa. I never went to a recording of the Oprah show – just to the shop to buy these shoes, which I’ve had sitting in my home ever since.
I was once a big follower of the “Church of Oprah” but I’ve since gained a slightly more objective view. I think that perhaps the popularisation of the self-esteem movement and the idea that you can be, do and have anything might be tenets of my generation that haven’t always been so constructive. And Oprah really popularised that.
But I think that the impact of the show and the way she took her audience on a journey was nonetheless spectacular. I still recognise her cultural significance and importance.
My most useful object
It’s a tool from my makeup bag. I don’t know what it’s called but it’s a pen that’s made for picking up Swarovski crystals and gluing them down. It’s actually designed for putting stones on costumes, but I use it on my face and it’s so handy. One end is a dotter that you dip into the glue. The other end is this wax substance that is just sticky enough to pick up the crystal – but not too sticky – so when you put it on your face where you’ve placed the glue, it sticks instantly.
Crystals just add so much extra oomph. I only got this tool in the last 12 months and before that, I would always sit there balancing a crystal on my finger, trying to stick it in the right place under my eye with great difficulty. I’d just put a couple on. But now with this tool, I can go ham and stick on hundreds! Well, maybe not hundreds – who has the time? Maybe just for Mardi Gras.
The item I most regret losing
When I was 12, I went on a bus tour of south-east Queensland with a theatre company. It was an end of school-year tour where we would perform this loosely educational Christmas-themed production. There were 40 kids in the show and together we would travel all the way from Rockhampton through to Biloela, Emerald, Gladstone and Toowoomba.
Back then I basically didn’t understand the concept of belongings and looking after things. And on that trip, I lost everything that I left the house with – my sister’s camera, which she’d kindly let me take, along with all my luggage and everything else.
From that day forward, I was always known as the kid who lost things. And that reputation followed me around until I was 18 and able to move to Sydney, where I could recreate myself anew. But every now and then someone from Brisbane who remembers me from that time is like “oh, that’s Shane, the kid that loses everything”. Weirdly, it was a horrible burden to carry around because it became like a part of my identity.
Moving away from home was very handy when it came to sexuality and gender and all that sort of stuff, because it meant there was no one looking over my shoulder. But even that strange little thing of being Shane, the kid that lost everything – that was lovely to leave behind.
